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MIDI 2.0
Just saw this on the tube today.
Looks very cool.
They were saying that this was going to be baked into Windows.
The latency figures that were given were really promising as well.
Comments
The other changes being made with Windows MIDI are important too - a better driver for all USB MIDI devices, and a proper server-client model for MIDI on Windows so that more than one app can access the same MIDI port at the same time (and this works with existing hardware and software). An early WIndows 11 canary release with this stuff in became available in recent days.
As for MIDI 2.0, it will be nice to finally see more devices come out that support various different features of MIDI 2.0, because the benefits will be more obvious via actual products than it is when just talking about the various different new features on paper. Though DAW support will be a mixed bag for quite some time to come.
Apple have had MIDI 2.0 in macos and ios/ipados for ages, but I hope they add the MIDI 2.0 network side of the specification, that was ratified recently, to their OSes this year. Because currently if you connect ipad to mac using Apples built in network MIDI, I believe things revert to MIDI 1.0.
Maybe stupid question, but what are actual updates from midi 1, why would companies/people switch to new one?
There is a talk about midi 2.0 for quite some time, but still slow and hard to implement, why?
The changes are huge. Like morse code to telephone huge. Too much to summarize when google is available to anyone.
A few reasons I can guess at why it's not wider spread:
Some of the slowness is just chicken & egg stuff, and waiting for the right pieces to fall into place. The lack of Windows support for too long made it harder to get past the chicken & egg phase rapidly.
It doesnt really matter in the grand scheme of things because it doesnt matter if it takes many years to start to be used more. If individual manufacturers and developers start to do various things with it that adds compelling functionality that some users want, it will eventually gain more traction and adoption will start to spread into more areas, eg into more DAWs. Compelling products with compelling features that people can readily understand the benefit of are key to this, not nerds like me dryly describing the tech spec.
Aspects of it are also backwards-compatible, which will also help even if we end up with a situation where some bits of it dont ever seem to catch on, eg it will still be present at the OS level and for some devices or apps, even if most people arent using it most of the time. Other pieces of the puzzle start to fall into place as more of the building blocks that hardware and software developers use fall into place, making it much easier for people to add this stuff to their products on some level, without having to reinvent the wheel themselves.
For any part of it to have some sort of future, we only need one or more of the following to gradually get used by some things, providing certain solutions for some issues for some people some of the time:
1) Network-based transport of MIDI messages. Different solutions have existing on this front for years but now with MIDI 2.0 there is a proper standard for this. This may become useful for computer-computer connections, or for hardware devices using wired or wireless networking. Some people who recognise the limitations of DIN connections, but arent completely satisfied with USB for MIDI, may have good reasons to want to see this side of things succeed. Also has uses in a fairly large, spaced out setup, due to longer cable lengths and more complex topology that networks offer. Even when considering making older, existing hardware fit into this setup, it is feasible if bridging devices become affordable. eg run a network cable to another room, where a device that sits on the end of that cable can then plug into various MIDI DIN and USB MIDI synths etc.
2) Scenarios where 16 MIDI channels arent enough. MIDI 2.0 introduces 16 groups which can have 16 channels each.
3) High resolution control messages, everything from CC's to Note velocity. Some musicians, controllers, keyboards or alternative surfaces may find a use for that, including products that arent currently feasible that will be if this stuff is more readily available.
4) Taking MPE further. Yes MPE has already caught on pretty well and works within the confines of MIDI 1.0. But theres more than one expansion of this stuff available in the MIDI 2.0 spec - Existing MPE can be used, but also there is an enhanced version of MPE that works in the same way as normal MPE, but increases the resolution. Alternatively, the MIDI 2.0 spec also allows for a non-MPE solution where loads of additional per note/per voice control signals are available, without having to use more than one MIDI channel. We do not know what people may want to invent in future that might actually make use of some of these options, eg by offering even more dimensions of expressivity per note, by using a higher resolution, etc. In theory such things might also want to take advantage of stuff I've mentioned in some of my other points, eg they might want to use network transport (wired or wireless) or take advantage of more channels, more modern form of messaging (and possibilities for message timing correction).
5) More automatic configuration and mapping between devices, via MIDI 2.0 CI and Property Exchange. We know a lot of musicians find manual mapping and labelling of cc etc stuff tedious and time-consuming, so it is plausible that this aspect of MIDI 2.0 might catch on more quickly than some of the others. Korg have already been dabbling with this stuff in a keyboard controller and in some of their recent synths. Others may test these waters too. And unlike most other aspects of MIDI 2.0, this stuff can still work over the classic MIDI DIN connections, albeit you need to use both input and output DIN conenctions between devices to make this work.
We have already seen that any initially optimistic predictions of how quickly MIDI 2.0 might catch on have already proven to be incorrect. But this doesnt really give me a good guide as to whether some aspects of MIDI 2.0 will eventually become popular and broadly adopted, it only tells me that the journey has been very slow so far. It doesnt matter, especially since even in scenarios where MIDI 2.0 does catch on, the death of MIDI 1.0 is in no way a requirement. The longevity of the original MIDI spec is clear for all to see, people want to use some equipment that is many decades old because plenty of this equipment isnt discarded like some other forms of technology are, because some of it takes the form of cherished instruments that people dont want to see the back of. And thats fine, MIDI 2.0 can gradually prosper without creating a world where we have to abandon MIDI 1.0 equipment.
Also when it comes to Windows, there are side benefits, even if none of the MIDI 2.0-specific stuff catches on quickly at all. I already went on about this here but I may as well repeat myself.
eg Windows MIDI implementation wasnt very impressive, going back decades when it came to both the built in USB MIDI class compliant driver and other OS MIDI limitations which meant most devices were blocked from being accessed by more than one app at the same time.
When they wrote a new MIDI system that could handle MIDI 2.0, they also took the opportunity to fix this other stuff at the same time, and these benefits extent to existing windows software and MIDI 1.0 equipment that you plugin into a Windows computer. Now its just a question of waiting for this to roll-out to mainstream Windows 10 & 11 consumer releases (right now its available in Windows 11 if you run the latest Insider canary build).
Look how long we've had 14-bit midi, NRPNs, and OSC available. I wouldn't call those widely adopted either.
I wonder in what year Microsoft will make Bluetooth MIDI work properly out of the box 😄